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Art Expedition: 2013 Edition

Published: 5/15/2013

Meet Manitoba's talented artists on their own turf. From sculptors, painters, carvers and potters, creative types open their home studios to art admirers. Watch art in action and take home a favourite piece at events throughout the summer and fall.

Alan Lacovetsky's life was altered by a single moment in his childhood.

On the side of an old wine jug, the youngster discovered a potter's thumbprint frozen in time.

"The imprint of a finger on a pot lasts forever," he says, recalling the memory.

The discovery cast a spell upon him: "Each pot has an energy, an aura of life."

Lacovetsky, today a master potter himself, tells the story to a group of art lovers standing rapt inside his Stonewall-area studio. Later, using his potter's wheel, he deftly carves a bowl with a trimming tool. Afterward, guests peruse Lacovetsky's finished work and buy their favourites. And then, they're off. There's many more artists to meet and art to admire.

Lacovetsky's studio is just one stop on the WAVE Interlake Artists' Studio Tour-a bi-annual self-guided car tour that takes an intimate look at the lives and work of rural Manitoba artists. (WAVE is just one of many rural Manitoba art tours held each summer and fall.)

With a WAVE brochure and blue and white flags planted along the route, explorers spend a weekend in June driving from Winnipeg to Gimli, and through Clandeboye, Matlock, Ponemah, Winnipeg Beach and Sandy Hook along the way. (The trip can easily be made in a day.)

The tours-which started in 2002-have become a huge success, drawing art admirers from across Manitoba and farther afield. A second fall tour was added. Last year, more than 30 artists welcomed 400 visitors to their studios during the June event. In 2012, WAVE also won an award of distinction from the Interlake Tourism Association. Spend a day studio-hopping in the Interlake and you'll see why!

Take your own art adventure in Manitoba. Check out these six 2013 artist studio tours: